Pure Punk Picks
Fight The Power – Public Enemy
When I first heard Public Enemy’s first release, “It Takes A Nation Of Millions To Hold Us Back”- I was blown away.
I had the same feeling I had a few years before when listening to The Sex Pistols.
It had the same energy, the same excitement, the same rebellion and a feeling of something new is descending upon my ears. Something that will probably guarantee that I won’t listen to music the same way again.
That’s what The Ramones did to me, probably The Velvet Underground and The Stooges, as well. And then these bands did, also.
Rap- real rap is punk. And what this song encourages? Well, there can be no better advice.
Perhaps, more so now than any other time- we got to fight the powers that be.
“Hey, Slimedog! What are you tryin’ to pull here?”
Yeah, I know this is a rap band not a punk band. But did you know that I consider rap- black punk? At least, I do of the most vital stuff of this genre.
There are so many correlations between punk and rap. Punk started in the mid seventies in the Bowery section of Manhattan, rap started in the Bronx not that long after.
Both styles of music had musicians who had an aversion to using their real names. In punk it was Johnny Rotten, Sid Vicious, Poly Styrene- in rap it was Grandmaster Flash, Chuck D, Flavor Flav.
And both styles created music that was jarring to mainstream expectations- whether in rock or R&B.
But most importantly, both went up against a music industry, comprised of older, white hippies who wanted to maintain the status quo. They dismissed both styles as “noise not music”, played by people who “were really not musicians.”
I was convinced that punk music was going down the tubes commercially, in the eighties, which it did- not being accepted until the nineties which surprised me. But I always felt that, not only was rap vital, but commercial as well and would have success- and I was right. This new black music would storm the barricades and succeed.
Why do I feel that punk and rap are so important?
Both genres did not try to fit in with the accepted scenes that existed before them. But did try to express what they truly felt and witnessed in life without adjusting to the bullshit that they experienced around them.
When people honestly express what they feel and what they see, it usually upsets people because those people are living with false ideals and don’t want to accept that.
And these genres contain individuals who don’t usually have lofty ideas and inspirations toward being “artists” but, being so individualistic and uncompromising and reflecting new ideas, they often end up creating the best art of their times.
That’s what makes punk and rap so vital. They are the blood and passion, hopes and dreams, joy and heartbreak of their generation- not the one from the past, but because of this they continue to inspire generations after them because of their uniqueness, integrity and power.
“Elvis was a hero to most but he never meant shit to me, you see. Straight up racist sucker, he was- simple and plain. Motherfucker- him and John Wayne.”
Elvis is a hero to me and might, or might not have been a racist. But that’s inconsequential, because the passion and power that rings out in this song equals the righteous anger of a tune by The Clash or Bob Marley or John Lennon’s “Working Class Hero.” Accurate or not, this is the most exciting, the most intense, the best part of this song.
When I listen to this song I think of the James Brown song “Say It Loud (I’m Black And I’m Proud). Same forceful, direct expression of anger and not giving in to the status quo. There’s a sense of urgency and venomous detachment in this song, as there is in any great punk tune.
This song is used in one of my favorite movies, “Do The Right Thing” by Spike Jones, who to me, is the black Martin Scorcese. Two of the very best directors, both working out of New York. Much like rap and punk, both of New York.
And this song is used just before the most explosive, the most violent, the most real scene in the movie.
Punk, in America, was rebellion against the music industry. Then, shortly after, against the government in England. But punk has and will always be, a revolt against “the powers that be.”
And if you’re fine with how mainstream society treats women, minorities, immigrants and the LGBT crew- sorry, I don’t think you’re really a punk.
But I do think that rap, at its’ most potent, is equal to the very best of punk. NWA, Public Enemy are equal to The Clash and The Dead Kennedys to me.
You may point out, “Hey, Slimedog! They don’t play the same music! It’s totally different, at least from what I hear!”
I would suggest you listen a bit more closely.
Not to the notes or to the rhythms or the sounds.
But the feeling, the attitude, the passion that is flying straight at you, crashing through your ears, bashing through you into your mind and soul.
Two different flavors, two different tastes but the results- what you’re truly feeling and hearing, is really the same.
“From the start, a work of art. To revolutionize make a change, nothing’s strange. People, we are the same.”
But the next lyric is, “We are not the same.”
And that’s where I disagree.
All music that is rebelling against the grain of accepted society is punk- no matter what genre it is.
And no matter what your gender, race or sexual orientation is-
We need to fight and win against the powers that be!
(Slimedog)
